Over the years, foster parents have earned a bad reputation. However, the truth is that not all foster parents or neglectful or abusive or just in it for a government check. There are millions of loving foster parents out there who truly love and care for children. They invest their hearts and souls into making sure kids feel loved and safe, in many cases, for the first time in that child’s life. Sadly, some courts decide it’s always best to return children to abusive home environments simply because they share a blood connection. This isn’t always in the best interest of the child, as you will see in this fictional account in which a judge orders that a child be removed from his loving foster family and returned to his abusive biological mother.
I am devastated. I need to vent. My cousin and his family have been foster parents for a while. Almost two years ago, they were given a baby boy at the age of one-month-old, who was born two days after my own son. CPS told them from the beginning that it would be temporary, as the parents wanted to get their child back. He was a bit delayed but made strides since his foster family really worked with him.
There was to be a hearing at 6 months old. The biological parents failed to meet the terms of the court and failed to get their son back at that time (drugs and other issues). In fact, they had four other children they’d already lost all rights to. Despite my cousin’s objections that they wanted to adopt the boy, the judge extended the parent’s chances to one year.
Another six months go by and, again, the parents fail to meet the judge’s standard to get custody of their child back. Again, the foster family says they want to adopt the boy, and again, the judge feels that children belong with their biological parents, and gives the parents a third chance. At 18 months old, the boy is finally returned to his parents, whom he hardly knows.
We just found out that, yesterday, at 22 months old, the biological mother has beaten this little boy to death.
I cannot comprehend it. I look at my own son and I cannot fathom a person who could hurt a child that small. I had always thought that, from time to time, I would wonder how that little boy was doing, as my own son grew. They had played together and were so close in age. But now all I can think is what an absolute waste. What horrible suffering that little boy went through. How no one could protect him. And what a f***ing s***show our “Justice” system is.
I was obviously unhappy with how things had turned out, so I wrote a formal letter to the judge asking him to heavily consider how my cousin and his family were feeling. They had just lost a little boy whom they cared for dearly. I explained (without being patronizing of course) that the little boy had been beaten to death by his biological mother. She wasn’t really his mom, you know? Aside from blood, she wasn’t a woman who raised him. Biological parents are not necessarily family and the baby didn’t know anyone else. After two years of raising this boy as their own, my cousin and his family were their parents, really, and his “real mom” was consistently unable to care or raise him. That was pretty evident when she killed him.
I don’t really know where else to turn with this, but I hope that the case will prevent the judge (and other judges) from making the same mistake.
Please share this if you think she did the right thing.
